Five Futures

Climate Change and five possible future-scenarios

On 13^th of October the Internet-Forum “Forum for the Future” published their new report about five possible future-secenarios in relation to the climate change on their website www.forumforthefuture.org. The work of the internet-forum “Forum for the Future” tries to have a look into the future by analyzing environmental threatens and by creating future-scenarios. Within doing this the forum tries to bridge between environmental topics and other important men’s life determining issues, so as social and economical issues. To work out a future-report with good quality the future-forum discussed, interviewed and spoke with seventy experts, including economists, scientists, journalists, environmentalists and social scientists. The result of their work is an amazing report which shows, that we still have the chance for the change.

Scenario Number One: Efficiency first

In this scenario the world starts to pay more attention to new technologies and innovations. Throughout this the use of energy becomes more efficient. For instance the Sahara-desert becomes a fruitful oasis by using seawater desalination plants – at the same time these desalination plants are using solar-collectors which causes a huge resource of sun energy. In this scenario the mankind tries to make new innovations before important resources run out: Artificial grown meat feeds thousands of people for example. And other materials which blame the environment are replaced by new environmental-friendly materials – paper is replaced by an artificial alternative for example. The development of “smart dust” which works like drones brings up the possibility to prevent a lot of pollution, natural catastrophes and disasters.

Scenario Number Two: Service Transformation

Also in this scenario mankind can prevent a huge catastrophe caused by climate change. But this second scenario pays more attention to the reluctance of the most common people to change their behavior related to environmental protection. The scenario says that mankind has to be pushed to protect the environment by for example enormous high taxes on CO₂-emissions. These taxes could release a kind of economical service revolution. This development would be the next step on the ladder of economical development after the industrial revolution in the 18^th century: Because of the enormous high taxes on CO₂-emissions there would be a decrease of industrial economy and an increase of service economy. There would be also a change in the mind of the common people: Using the bike instead of the car and going to the laundry-service instead of using the own washing machine would be usual – but only because own a car or a washing machine would be too expensive. According to the report of the future-forum this scenario would have bad sites, too: Territories which are difficult to occupy like the Australian Outback and the inner part of South-America of Africa would be given up.

Scenario Number Three: Redefining process

This scenario is one of the most utopistics scenarios of the report. After a worldwide economical depression which takes nine years the mankind changes their way of life. Instead of working a lot and making profit as much as possible people now pay more attention to living comfortable. A redefining process all over the world maintains the value of well-being and life-quality. This includes a decrease of working hours per day for instance. According to the authors of the future-forum-report this scenario not shows a post-capitalism world. In fact the people are working and making profit but they don’t value money as one of the most important things of humankind’s life. Relating to this there are some black sheep: big cities which have set themselves up to places of “totally capitalism” in which people live who declare the “heaven of real capitalism” – because they can profit and plunder a lot while the majority of humankind pays attention to their life-quality.

Scenario Number Four: Environmental War Economy

In this scenario the report describes a mankind which responded too late to the climate change. The world-trade breaks down and the energy-prices explode. Those who consume too much energy are cut from the energy-infrastructure and couples who want to get children have to collect points in order to acquire a license for getting children. The lot of natural catastrophes and disasters are causing a big movement of migration. According to future-forum’s report even Antarctica will be a destination for “climate refugees”.

Scenario Number Five: Protectionist World

This is the most darken scenario of the report. In it the world’s states start to fight each other although they have made agreements of protecting the environment. Accusations that some states are running power plants secretly made by other states cause political conflicts and wars and in the Near-East starts a chemical war about the drinkwater resources. In relation to this political deployment the world-trade breaks down: every state tries to save its own resources. An economical protectionist world economy is the result. Prices increases and people becoming poor which cause more grave problems: medical supply decreases for instance and thousands of people die because of diseases.

Of course some scenarios of the report are kind of utopic and not probably. Sometimes they seem to be too good and sometimes they seem to be too bad. But all in all the future-forum has achieved with their work a really interesting report which shows that – in relation to climate change – we can live with it well or worse. After all we cannot know how the future will be but maybe we can create; the report of the future-forum reminds us that we have to think about the consequences of our behavior and it gives – and this is really important – first ideas of doing something for a change. The next step now is to take up these ideas and to deal with it because: the change will come certainly and it’s just a question of time.